My nostrils stung with the smell of burning flesh, immediately making me wake up and gag. I sat up, looking at my surroundings only to notice that I was back in my tent. Recalling the night before, my mind went right back to my mother and a mindset of depression took over me. She was gone.
I got up and struggled to even bother changing out of my blood soaked clothing, but managed to get up and look through my bag, grabbing a pair of black legging and loosed blue t-shirt. Stepping out of the tent, I took a look at the still chaos, the dead bodies littering the ground before me. Most of the men were helping carry the bodies up the hill where graves were being dug for the camp members, and smoke from the burning walkers hit me once again. My father came up to me and put a hand on my shoulder, moving his head to where my mother's body lay ready to burn, like she wanted.
Cremation, she told us while we talked about it years before. If she were to ever pass early, thats what she wanted. To be sprinkled over the Atlantic ocean off the coast of Nova Scotia, where she was born.
"Unfortunately," I thought to myself, "I'm sorry, mum, but I don't think you'll be getting there.." My father and I picked up her body and proceeded to put her into the back of Daryl's pick-up. We both rode along side her, to avoid walking up the hill in the Atlanta summer heat.
As soon as we reached the top, we both slid off the back and grabbed mum once again. Shane pointed us to an empty grave, and we slowly lowered her in. After all I could do was look. Look at the woman who gave birth to me, who raised me who cared for me. All I thought of was that it should have been me in there. If I didn't go out with them, if I stayed here with her and dad, I could have saved her, I could have taken her place. That's what should have happened. Tears started to roll down my cheeks, and they showed no signs of stopping. I made no noise, I didn't move. I just sat staring at her dead body, cursing myself and my stupidity.
I looked up as I heard someone approaching me. Shane stood in front of me offered his hand. When I grabbed it, he brought me into a hug. I started to shake, and finally let it all out. He rubbed my back and ran his fingers through my hair in attempt to calm me down. We stood like that for a few minutes, the only sound my sobbing.
"Shane," my father spoke, "it's time." I turned out of Shane's grasp to see my father holding a jerry can and a box of matches. I wiped my tears away with the bottom of my shirt as I slowly walked back to my mother's grave. Dad started to pour gasoline in the grave, then he handed me the box of matches. He put his hand on my shoulder as I swiped the match along the end of the package, and the tip lit up with a small flame. I looked at my father and he nodded, giving me the go-ahead. Flicking my fingers, the match flew forward then down into the grave, then burst into flames as it hit the gas.
I couldn't even watch as her body burn for very long, so turning away I could only walk, walk down to the camp, grabbed my knife and continued to walk until I hit the edge of the water in the quarry. I stripped down to my panties, walked out to where the water hit halfway up my torso and took a couple deep breaths. I gripped the knife in my right hand, and tears rolled down my face again. The tip rested on my thigh, where many scars marked the previous sessions that happened a month before, and years before then. I told myself the last time that I would do this anymore, no matter what happened, but I couldn't have ever imagined that my mother dying this young would ever happen. From the inside out, I dragged the blade until the water around me was stained red.
After, I could not cry. My pain was nothing compared to what my mother must have felt lying on the ground with her killer resting so close to her. Was no where near the amount of sorrow she would of felt knowing that her time on this earth was shorted to just mere minutes. Nothing like the strain on her emotions after realizing that she would never see her family ever again. It was my fault that she felt any of that. All I ever wanted was for us to survive this horrible apocalypse as a family. And out of five, our family was down to two. My father and I.
My sister and her daughter were the first to go. It was within the first week. While my parents and I were first setting up camp, and the satellites were still up, we received a call from our neighbours telling us what had been happening and that a horde from the town next to ours came through our home town and took most of the population with it. It included my sister and her three year old daughter. My mother and father were devastated and I just didn't know how to feel. So I didn't feel, and now that my mother is gone it is hitting me twice as hard.
I decided to walk back to the shore, and sit on the rocks that were near the edge of the water. The blood had slowed a bit, but still trickled down the sides of my thighs, then down the face of the rock. Looking at my reflection, all I could see was how tired I was, the bags under my eyes so dark it looked as if I hadn't slept in weeks. Most of the color had drained from my face and I almost looked like one of them. Like one of those walkers.
Footsteps resonated within the canyon. I turned my head to see who was walking down the trail, looking through my hair I saw Dale with a towel making his way to me. He said no words as he approached me. He motioned for me to get down and come over. I slipped myself off of the rock and moved to him. Dale took the towel and rested it over my shoulders. He said nothing about my legs, thankfully.
"It will be ok." was the only thing he said before turning himself around to proceed back up the trail to the camp. I didn't really take the words in, though I know he meant well by them.
After watching him disappear up the road, I took the towel and started to dry myself off. The blood had clotted by now and started to crust over. Walking back over the the edge of the water, I dipped the towel into the water and started getting all the dry blood off of my legs. It didn't take too long, and after I proceeded to put my clothes back on.
My walk up the hill was much slower than I intended it to be. But when I reached the top of the hill I didn't expect to see everyone packing their things up and into vehicles. What the hell were they doing?
"What's going on?" I asked my father, who was taking our tent down at the current moment. "We are leaving," he told me, "and going to the CDC." The CDC?
"When was this decided?" He gave me a look I didn't quite understand. "When you were sitting on your ass down in the quarry doing nothing." I looked away from him, not bothering to correct him on what I had done. I muttered an ok and walked over to our bags and started to pick them up.
"Where do you want me to put these?" I asked quietly. "Put them in the jeep." I looked around and saw it down in front of the box truck. I walked over and threw our bags in the back and turned back to my father to see if there was anything else that needed to be done. Just the odd ends of helping others with their belongings and making sure nothing was left behind. Of course most of it was prioritized so we couldn't bring everything along, only the necessities.
The next few minutes went by fast, everybody getting set up, getting ready by their cars waiting for the next set of instructions to come.
"Alright everybody, listen up," I heard Shane speak from in front of the RV. "For those of you who have CB's we'll be on channel 40. If anything comes up, and you can't get to your CB or it's dead or whatnot, just hit your horn once, and we'll stop the caravan." he explained. "Any questions?"
Morales spoke up, "We're ah, not going with you guys. We got family up in Birmingham. We want to see if they are ok." Everyone looked silently at them, nothing to say but 'Be careful' or 'are you sure'. One by one we all said goodbye to them, giving handshakes and hugs where they were expected.
"Alright now, let's go. Lets move out!" Shane directed the rest of us as we compiled into our respective cars. We started up the road, following it down to the main road where we first came in. Morales and his family went their way, as the rest of us, following the RV made our way to the CDC. I sat in the backseat, with most of our stuff to keep me company, while Shane and my father conversed in the front.
I looked, out of the car, anything to keep my mind off of my mother and their voices out of my head. We stayed on the outside of the city for as long as we could, passing small towns and broken down houses that sat along the road. I felt the jeep slow down and pull to the side of the road, looking ahead to see what had happened to make us stop.
Steam spewed from in front of the RV, from what I could only think of was the radiator hose. Dale had said something about it giving out and on its last legs. Everyone piled out of their cars save for a few. I jumped out the back of the open wrangler to stretch and sit on the soft grass that lined the roadside. Rick and Dale sat in front of the RV, poking and prodding at the front trying to get the damn thing back together. Everyone else stood watch, looking around for any stray walkers that happened to walk by. Shane had his binoculars out looking up the road, mentioning that he saw something further down. I walked up beside him, trying to see what he was looking at.
"Looks like a gas station to me," he said. All of a sudden Jaqui sped out of the RV, "Jim isn't looking too good. He said he can't take it no more." and back into the van she went. We all looked at each other, trying to decide what to do.
"You wanna hold down the fort, Rick?" Shane asked. "I'll drive ahead, see what I can bring back?" Rick nodded to him, and T-Dog said he would go too.
"If you don't mind, I'd like to go as well." I spoke for the first time since we left the camp. Shane nodded to me and put his arm around my shoulder and guided me back to the jeep with T-Dog in tow. Shane was called back by Rick, and he left me and T-Dog to get ourselves situated into the car. He told me to sit in the front, so he didn't have to deal with any questions that the other man would ask. I complied and took the front, silently waiting for the policeman to come back and start our little trip.
As time went by, the two of us noticed that they were helping Jim out of the RV and up to a tree that was sitting farther up the side of the road. We both looked at each other, and silently agreed to walk up and see what was going on. When we arrived at the scene, we saw that everybody was saying goodbye to the infected man. I came up to Andrea and asked what they were doing with T-Dog behind me just as curious.
"He wants to be left behind. The car ride is getting too rough for him and he can't handle it. He just wants to be with his family." she explained and we both nodded. T-Dog turned to go say his goodbyes, and I followed. When I walked up and sat beside him, as I was the last to go, he put his hand on my thigh and turned to me.
"I know what you're going through," he told me to my surprise."And I know its not an easy thing to handle. I've lost my family too." he proceeded to tell me what happened to his wife and children, and I nodded understandingly. "I know given my circumstance I really have no right to say this," he took a deep breath and continued, "but it does get better. I know you don't want to believe it but give it time." I nodded and held his hand for a bit. Eventually we had to move on, and I said my goodbyes to him and wished him the best of luck, whatever it mean to him. I proceeded to walk back to the wrangler and got back to my seat in the back, and we all started the caravan back up. As we passed Jim, I waved, with a sad look on my face, hoping that he would go in his sleep.
We stopped up the road from where we left him and stopped by the gas station, syphoning gas and grabbing any useful things we could find, which wasn't much. Just small odds and ends, food which was mostly junk food.
Nothing else really happened during our pit stop. After finding everything else we wanted to take with us, we moved on to our destination. The drive lasted for about another forty minutes. When we finally ended up pulling into the vicinity, all we could see was dead bodies and military tanks and trucks strewn all over the place. Unfortunately it was both civilian and military. Shane ran his hands over his face in exhaustion and I could only hear my father curse from the backseat.
The three of us got out of the jeep, followed by the others in their respected cars. All of those who had weapons on them had them at the ready, and slowly approached the entrance of the CDC. While walking to the entrance the smell was overpowering. It was just dead bodies all over the place rotting, and the flies that overtook them.
The two police officers had a duet of 'keep together' and 'come on get moving'. We weaved our way through the disgusting obstical course to end up at the front doors, which seemed to be closed; reinforced. Both Rick and Shane tried everything they could to try and get in, getting very frustrated while doing it.
"There is nobody here." T-Dog spoke up from behind the group. Rick didn't believe it. "Then why are the shutters down. Someone has to be in there."
"Walkers!" we heard Andrea call out. I turned around to see only one, and immediately took my tomahawk to it's head, ending it with a satisfying squelch. I ripped it back out and looked angry at Rick for putting us in this situation.
"You made this call!" Daryl hollard at Rick, pointing his finger. "The wrong damn call!" Shane intercepted the country boy before he could get to Rick. "Hey! Shut up now! You shut up!" He turned to the latter, "Rick, this is a dead end."
"What are we going to go?!" Carol called out in panic holding Sophie tightly in her arms. "She's right Rick," said Lori. "we can't be this close to the city, it's getting too dark."
"What's your plan now? There is no way we are getting in." My father interrupted the looked around at all of us. Mostly annoyance from people, and from the rest, panic. "Fort Benning, Rick. It's still an option." Shane said and my father nodded to solidify his idea.
"There's gotta be something we can do," Rick responded. I can see the panic starting to settle in on his features.
"Common everyone! Back to the cars!" Shane ushered us, putting the hand on the small of my back.
"NO! Wait the camera moved!" He shouted back to us. Shane walked up to the supposedly delusional man. "No we have to go. It's an automated device. Let's go." he said, grabbing the man and trying to get him to follow, while the rest of us paused to wait for them. Shane started yelling at his friend, trying to get him to come with us but he persisted. Rick started banging on the doors of the compound.
"I know you're in there! I know you can hear me. Please, we're desperate." He pleaded with the camera that was in fact, moving to see him. "Please help us! We have women and children. No food, and hardly any gas left. Please!" but it was useless, and Shane grabbed his arm, pulling him aggressively towards the cars that sat idly on the road behind us.
"You're killing us!" he shouted. "You're killing us! You're killing us!" Shane continued to drag him on. Suddenly the doors rose upward. A bright light shone from inside and we couldn't see in. Everyone stood in their spots, stunned to see that Rick was right, not that we really minded. We all looked at each other, waiting to see if anyone would make a move to go inside.
Rick looked at Shane, then to his family and nodded. "Lets go."